The invention relates to financial transactions processing systems which can be provided, for example, in banks and other banking environments.
A typical bank branch office includes a teller counter having one or more teller stations. The teller counter typically separates the branch office into a teller area on one side of the counter, and a customer area on the other side of the counter. In some banks, an additional transparent (possibly bullet-proof) partition is located above the counter to further separate the teller area from the customer area. Each teller station typically includes a teller display monitor that faces the teller, and thus can be viewed only by the teller. When a customer makes a transaction with a teller at one of the teller stations, the teller enters the customer information (for example, the customer's account number) into a teller computer which communicates with a bank computer, and then information about the customer's account can be displayed to the teller over the teller display monitor.
Because the teller display faces the teller, and the teller and customer are separated by the teller counter (possibly including the additional transparent partition), the customer cannot view the information on the teller display. The inability of the customer to view the teller display can be inconvenient, for example, when the teller seeks to confirm the correctness of the information on the display, or when the customer desires access to the information on the display, for example, the account balance in the customer's account. To provide the customer with the customer's account balance, the teller typically must write this information on a slip of paper that is then given to the customer.
A more recent trend in the banking industry is to provide stand-alone podiums (sometimes called towers) containing one or two teller stations around which tellers and customers can move. Examples of such stand-alone podiums/towers are provided in, for example, U.S. Pat. No. 6,681,985, the disclosure of which is incorporated herein by reference in its entirety. Also see De La Rue Cash Systems GMBH and Plan Object GMBH, “Dialog Banking in der Praxis”, Mörfelden-Walldorf, February, 1999. These stand-alone podiums also, however, include a display only for the teller (podiums/towers with two teller stations include a teller display for each of the tellers). If the teller display is built into the podium, then the customer needs to move to the teller's side of the podium in order to view the display. If the display rests on top of the podium, then the teller may be able to move the display so that the customer can view the display, or again, the customer can move to the teller's side. However, either of these procedures is inconvenient. In addition, because the teller's display screen sometimes includes information that is not intended for viewing by the customer (for example, alerts regarding the customer or the customer's account), the teller may not want the customer to view the teller's display. However, in such a situation, it may be difficult for the teller to prevent the customer from viewing the teller's display in the stand-alone podium/tower environment.
As society in general becomes more and more accustomed to being involved in banking transactions (for example, due to the use of automated teller machines and Internet banking), many customers prefer to have access to the information that presently is displayed to the teller. In addition, providing a display for the customer may tend to keep the customer occupied so that the transaction seems to take less time.
De La Rue Cash Systems offers a “data display”, which is a small unit containing a one or two line display that can be viewed by the customer at a teller counter. These displays, however, provide the following three messages: (1) WELCOME, when no activity is taking place; (2) PROCESSING YOUR TRANSACTION, when a teller requests a transaction for the customer; and (3) CASH BACK $xxx, when cash is dispensed to the customer.